North Korea Launches Missile Towards Japan - Passes Over Okinawa

Now that is a rattling sabre. While markets for now are seemingly shrugging off this 'fly-by', we suspect the people of Okinawa were more than a little surprised:

NORTH KOREA LAUNCHED ROCKET AT 9:51 AM LOCAL TIME: YONHAP

N. KOREA ROCKET LAUNCHED IN SOUTHERLY DIRECTION,JAPAN GOVT SAYS

N. KOREA ROCKET PASSES OVER JAPAN'S OKINAWA, NHK SAYS

JAPAN GOVT: NO ORDER GIVEN TO SHOOT DOWN N.KOREA ROCKET

N. KOREA ROCKET EXPECTED TO FALL IN SEA EAST OF PHILIPPINES:NHK

What is most surprising is not the rocket launch: it was largely expected and overdue after the humiliation from the last one; it is that Korea has brazenly defied US warnings and the threat of sanctions just to make a rather meaningless political point. The imminent escalation in sanctions and N.Korea's response is what is the true variable here, confirmed by the markets who have not even blinked as a result of the rocket launch.

He is white according to at least some black people. I was in Gabon earlier this year and a group of Gabonese nationals asked me if Obama was considered black and I said "yes, he is considered our first black president". The all started laughing at me.

Look that the map and get a grip people. The missile was aimed the only way to NOT go over another country. As usual, everyone -- ZH included -- wants to breathlessly make something out of nothing. Stop being so fucking shrill all the time.

What the hell is with your attitude? As much as you apparently believe everything you read and are most likely itchin' for the next war, what mkkby said was perfectly true and should be as obvious as the nose on your face. He sure didn't deserve a retort like that, which by the way normally come out of the mouths of 12 year olds.

"...it is that Korea has brazenly defied US warnings and the threat of sanctions just to make a rather meaningless political point."

"Brazenly defied U.S. warnings"? Please help me here. Warnings from Barak Obama? And what is it you'd expect your Prez-Uh-dent to do?

Impose sanctions on a nation we have absolutely nothing to do with? And I'd say the political point is anything but "meaningless"; evil or no, North Korea doesn't march to the dictates of other socialist dictators.

He is white according to at least some black people. I was in Gabon earlier this year and a group of Gabonese nationals asked me if Obama was considered black and I said "yes, he is considered our first black president". The all started laughing at me.

NK seriously has no sancitions in reality because all it's trade has been through China for...25 years. Not nearly as long as the Cuba sancitions, which are baffling considering the cold war is over (lol, no never ended, game became oil over ideology).

The same game has been going on, nothing changed after Glasnost. We just got better phones, TV's and online services. China is more than likely behind it attempting to provoke a sideways response from Washington through Japan. Japan doesn't have a pot to piss in, and South Korea is working on it with diesel shortages and brown outs/rolling blackouts. China needs all asian countries to shut the fuck up and listen.

Not sure how India will react. Their trade ties with the USA is fairly fragile, they might strike a deal. It's a country with an extra 70 million men with no possibility of finding a wife. China is in the same position. Lots of disposable zerg hoards and you are the countries that are the center of arms and munitions manufacturing on the planet.

So who do you back? Guy with a huge army that you've bumped into over the course of 7000 years and cash in the bank. Or the guy dicating terms to you that owes you money, you own his supply chain and you've got cash in the bank.

This will not play out how people think it will in Europe and North America. That currency that America could wield once is not longer the same offer. It's been spent with every backhanded news gesture and fed printing move. Indian culture is very, very old, they have a deep sense of their heritiage and history. They have a long memory as old as India. Like an elephant. And so does China.

China and India historically help each other get out of the way btw. They have pissing contests about water, but both countries know they need oil more if they are to continue their massive space programs (seriously, huge and well funded with excellent returns on science). Plus some really impressive engineering programs that both are collaborating on. CERN won't be the only place on the planet an LHC exists soon enough. Neither China or India would be willing to sacrifice the gains they've made.

Kadena Air Force Base also on Okinawa. Some very sensitive (expensive) assets have been rumored to fly out of there over there years... Some interesting scuba diving to be found in the area if you know where to look. USA: Proudly in decline since 1913

I no longer have to worry about being ruled over by an English monarch. Instead, I have to worry about being ruled over by an American monarch.

I no longer have to worry about the spread of fascism in European nations. Instead, I have to worry about the spread of fascism in my own nation.

I no longer have to worry about the spread of communism in Asian nations. Instead, I have to worry about the spread of communism in my own nation.

I no longer have to worry about mythical weapons of mass destruction in Middle Eastern nations. Instead, I have to worry about the genuine weapons of mass destruction my own nation deploys on Middle Eastern nations, causing them to deploy much cruder, yet vastly more effective weapons in my own nation.

Gee, thanks for your service. Now I don't have to read about things that happen all the way over in Wherethefuckisstan...I can just open my front door. Progress!

You're one of the reasons people these days fear military uniforms in airports. We don't know when you are going to decide to follow orders and corral us to FEMA camps or protect us from the evil ones. It's pricks like you that give America and your uniform a bad name and yes, to answer your question, I have been in the military and received an Honorable Discharge, as many here have.

Remember one thing: If the shit hits the fan, which seems very likely, and you do not honor your duty to the citizens you were sworn to protect along with your duty to constitution of the United States I assure you, you will be the first to be targeted.

Yeah, this is the thing. I don't hear very much from the gung-ho warrior class about defending the constitution from its enemies, especially those enemies who are in Government, on Wall St and on K St.

Because taking on real power, now with new improved NDAA inside, is fucking scary. It takes someone with balls of steel, like Chris Hedges, with his calls for civil disobedience, to even begin to do it.

I think North Korea is ahead - by offensively shooting missiles they are bringing attention to the need for missile proliferation and the need for world peace. I still think the US can win the next Nobel if we would just go ahead and bomb and obliterate Iran -to prevent them from threatening Israel and much of the rest of the world. What better way to poreserve the peace than to destroy all countries that could conceievably obtain WMDs. Makes sense to me. The Nobel Committee understands Stalin's rationale that sometimes to make an omelette, you have to break a few eggs.

If he did then he's dead. Shooter and 2 victims are down. Said the guy had a white mask on and some messages coming out said it was a Guy Fawkes mask. They're releasing people in the mall while checking things out. He thought he was going to be hiding a long time...

Sure, if you want that retaliation to happen over the course of ten years, plus 6 years for mandatory coffee breaks, accrued vacation time, and strikes. Hell, that's how long it takes the union to fix a one-mile stretch of highway in my state.

Original was Cubans and Russians. This one the North Koreans have the starring role. That is, after the People's Republic of China objected during production to being the bad guys and the script was changed to make them happy.

There seems to be a problem here in the world. People are not happy, anymore. We were happy. Not that long ago we were happy. There is anger in the air. There is a hungriness for hapiness. But we see hapiness is gone. Now is the time to be happy. The end is not coming. fiat is not happiness. nor is fiat happiness.

Al-Qaeda, Israel says over 3,000 confirmed Jihadist Al-Qaeda members are fighting as part of the Free Syrian Army. That was a few months ago, by now NATO has channeled at least another 3,000 from across the Middle East into Syria. By all accounts they are the only Free Syrian soldiers that are effective in combat. In their spare time they are reported to be shooting prisoners, beating up school girls, cut a guys head off yesterday, chasing out Christians and killing a few as a warning, engaged in torture of suspects, etc. etc. What's not to like? No wonder the CIA and Saudi Arabia are funding them. Our kind of folks. Assad must go, Al-Qaeda will replace him?

That was no missile, it was my '98 Hyundai. I was late for work, you see, and it just snowed a foot the day before. Car spun out, rolled, and ejected me out the window. I've been looking all over for the damn thing since!

I think the entire world owes China a debt of gratitude for pressing the U.S. in the South China Sea and on the Korean peninsula (since N. Korea is a proxy for China... this is... in effect... a Chinese missile launch). The statement is obvious... start messing with Chinese oil in Iran, and all hell is going to break loose in the Pacific. You do not have sufficient air and naval units to cover the entire Pacific rim, the Guilf, Iran, provide air support to Afghanistan, and cover the Suez Canal, Straits of Gibraltar, and other global choke points. This is China's message for the United States. Thank you China for reminding the idiots in Washington that the U.S. military is not the almighty force portrayed on television.

At this point in history, it seems likely, that any chance for global peace will hinge on the ability of Russia and China to keep U.S. aggression in check.

It wouldn't even go that far. Our military will not play ball when it comes to WWIII and the removal of our illegitimate federal government, from the Golfer in Chief on down in imminent. That's a lasting peace... the dismantling of our illegitimate, unconstitutional government.

"I no longer have to worry about the spread of communism in Asian nations. Instead, I have to worry about the spread of communism in my own nation."

Your own nation, if it is the USofA, is more capitalist than any other nation on the planet.

It is almost funny that some here refer to the half-baked, semi-national, almost-universal, close to-healthcare program, sometimes referred to Obamacare, as a "socialist" measure.

That's rich.

Socialism has not had to concern itself with the issue of healthcare for all in over 1/2 a century. That is no longer a socialist issue. It's taken for granted, and long since settled everywhere except the USofA.

The stress, angst, clamour, gnasing of teeth and hand wringing over something as simple as the recognition that all people in a modern society on earth, much less a post modern one, should obviously have basic health is reserved for the only died in the wool capitalist country in the world.

If there's anything unclear about healthcare not being a socialist issue (because it's not an issue in dispute any longer, and hasn't been for a long time), ask, I will try to help you name the system where it is an issue.

Hint: capitalism (and, yes, that is a bad word denoting a bad system).

Idiot. That's FASCISM. Being actually capitalist you need #1 capital not just debt #2 trading not just central control banks. So far as you have massive debt & central control over ever penny, every transaction, the medium itself re-translated into a one-legal-printer all-others-in-jail system you absolutely do not have capitalism.